'If Government imposes an energy price cap, people will change suppliers even less', says energy expert

If the Government introduces an energy price cap, then the public will be even less likely to switch suppliers.

That's according to energy expert Malcolm Grimston, who was reacting to the Conservative manifesto pledge to cap standard variable tariffs in energy bills.

Grimston, an honorary senior research fellow at Imperial College, told Julia Hartley-Brewer that the UK is desperately short of power, so needs to ramp up investment in new power stations, and some of that funding needs to come from energy bills.

Therefore, the real issue at the moment is actually how we get enough money in the system to pay for the fact we’ve hardly built any power stations for the last 15 years.

However, he admitted politicians become more popular by saying they'll stop providers from making so much money, even though they need those providers to make a profit.